We have collated the latest fraud and payment news and digested it into small chunks for you to enjoy.
In July’s FraudTech Digest we will be discussing:
🛒Pandemic fueled fraud cases
🏃Facebook Pay has landed on Shopify
🇪🇺Eurosystem launches the Digital Euro Project
💸Mastercard simplifies card payments for crypto firms
✋Action required to avoid a ransomware pandemic
🤝Mastercard and Verizon partner with 5G for contactless payments
💰Visa payments are up 34% due to debit fueling the engine of cash digitalisation
July FraudTech Digest #1
Consumers’ shopping habits and everyday tasks are majorly shifting. The pandemic is increasing this digital format. Fraud scams online during 2020 through till April 2021 have resulted in £2.3 billion being stolen from victims.
New figures from Which? suggest that the cybercrime reports in the UK have increased by 33% (that’s a third in 12 months!).
Phone and text scams have seen the biggest increase, up 83% from the previous year. Following this, online shopping scams went up by 65%.
Overall, scams went up by 33% in the year to April 2021 – compared to 8% the year before.
July FraudTech Digest #2
Facebook has launched its payments feature aiming to consolidate payments services across its main app, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp.
According to Finextra, Facebook Pay is expanding to third party eCommerce sites, starting with Shopify merchants.
It is aiming to break outside of its ecosystem and join payment giants services like PayPal, Google and Apple. It will fight to become the next best payment option at checkout.
The US companies using participating platforms will have the ability to enable Facebook Pay as a payment option from August.
The rollout is expected to join multiple platforms and payment service providers over time.
The investigation phase will last 24 months and aims to address key issues regarding the digital euro’s design and distribution. The ECB states the key needs of Europeans will be met during this construction, whilst avoiding undesirable impacts on financial stability and monetary policy. It is emphasised that the digital euro will complement cash and not replace it.
During the investigation phase the ECB will continuously engage with external parties including European policymakers, European Parliament, citizens, merchants and the payment industry.
Finally, the investigation phase of the digital euro will assess the possible issues of individuals’ privacy and how to build an ecosystem that avoids these risks ensuring that ‘’citizens and firms continue to have access to the safest form of money, central bank money”.
July FraudTech Digest #4
Today, major providers of crypto such as Bitcoin, Ether and Litecoin are facing a major challenge. This challenge is that in order for people to spend different cryptocurrencies it has to enter Mastercard’s network as a fiat currency. This has proven to be a major challenge for crypto providers.
Finextra states Mastercard is using the USDC stablecoin to allow its customers to spend their cryptocurrency with its cards.
Mastercard aims to solve this issue by enabling banks and crypto companies to offer a card option to people wanting to spend their digital assets. They are engaging with large digital asset companies like Evolve and Paxos to deliver on their consumer payment choice promises.
This call is taking place due to the growing cases inside the cybercrime ecosystem, with criminals altering their tactics and business modules to enable them to start providing ransomware-as-a-service.
The Secretary General Stock has stated Ransomeware has become too large of a threat for any entity to tackle alone and urgently demands global action.
Chainalysis’s research found that these criminals made $350 million in 2020 from ransomware payments, showing a 311% increase from the previous year.
Collective efforts need to be made in the attempt to curb ransomware attacks. These efforts come in the form of improving cyber hygiene across sectors, to raise cost and risk to cybercriminals.
July FraudTech Digest #6
According to CNBC Mastercard and Verizon have announced a partnership for 5G contactless payments for consumers. It also includes small and medium sized businesses. This collaboration will enable businesses to use emerging payment technologies to adapt smartphones into cash registers.
5G will enable businesses to manage transactions more quickly, focusing on their customers needs and expectations. A frictionless way businesses can transact with their customers and focus on their business.
The Mastercard-Verizon partnership aims to disrupt consumer spending at retailers. They will bring the computing and storage of data closer to consumers providing a quicker service that is more secure. This is essential for the financial industry where payment transaction security is a top priority.
July FraudTech Digest #7
Paymnts has concluded the global payments giant Visa has had a rise in its last quarter, showing consumer and business spending is increasing. The company stated its net revenues have surged by 27%.
Visa’s payment volume is growing, with their overall credit payments totalling to $1.2 trillion, up by 31% from the previous year. The total debit payment volume is $1.4 trillion which is 37% higher than the previous year. The CEO has highlighted that cash displacement trends have continued and debit spending is at 140% of pre-pandemic levels, with credit payments also rebounding.
The CEO states that debit is the engine of cash digitalisation and tap to pay is a key contribution to this acceleration. Many countries are increasing their transaction limits to the service to help strengthen this growth.
Pandemic has impacted the digital payments landscape greatly. At Cybertonica we are working hard to keep one step ahead of cybercrime. In the last 6 months, our product team has focused their attention on improving the insights that we provide our client’s fraud and risk analysts. An additional reporting and data access enable now for more granular views into the history of an account and the payment event that is challenged. Going forward we will see a further improvement in operational excellence enabling quicker and more accurate alert reviews capturing expert knowledge to improve future automated decision making.
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